Want Ad Becomes an "Assignment"

As my therapist was the one who suggested that I go to those singing Meetups, and as that did not work out, we decided I needed to regroup.

Surely in a city as big as New York, there must be other people like me. The question is how to find them. So what are my demographics, really?


1. I am what I laughingly refer to as a "tweenior", meaning I am not old enough for Social Security or Medicare or any other senior discounts but I am past middle age.

2. I started the serious study of singing late (whether or not I was studying seriously or even being serious about it when I studied before, between the ages of 26 and 30, is questionable, in retrospect).

3. I have a big operatic voice. (Whether or not singing is "only" a hobby, I am not a choral-type singer with a small pleasant voice.)

4. I still have some technical "issues" to work out and believe that my best singing is still ahead of me.

5. As I am a "newbie" to all this I am hungry hungry hungry hungry to do it. I am by no means "scaling back".

6. However, as I am the age I am, I have a whole life infrastructure that can't be thrown into disarray because I'm singing.

7. I do my best if I am one of the "better" (not the best, if I'm the best I'm in the wrong place) singers in a given group, so I am not going to thrive in a group full of YAPPers and older managed singers.

8. I want to be somewhere where my singing, and my story, would be of interest to other people who have had similar experiences. I don't thrive if I feel I'm being politely ignored, either.

9. Also, if I meet peers compared to whom I am performing at a high level, they might be interested in inviting me to perform somewhere with them, and I wouldn't have to do all the inviting and all the planning.

I was thinking about posting something on the Forum but even thinking about that place makes me want to crawl under the couch.

My therapist said Craigslist but that makes me nervous. Would leave myself open to too many crazies.

Maybe I'll post something in my pseudonymous blog. I have some regular readers, some of whom do know me by my real name also. They might have some advice.

I would have posted something there first, but no one is around on Sunday and the post would get lost.

Now I'm off to sing the alto part in a Bach cantata for Reformation Sunday, which is a big Lutheran holiday.

My Recording Angel

As I mentioned in this post a friend of my mother's who is a sound engineer offered to make a recording of me singing 8 arias (4 new ones, and a do-over of 4 old ones) free of charge.

Today, when we had lunch (at an Italian restaurant in Brooklyn that's been there since I was in High School - his treat) he said he would also pay the pianist not just for the recording but for two rehearsals.

All I will have to pay is to have the CD duplicated and for packaging. There's a man at the church who did that so he can give me some advice.

So today I emailed the pianist to start making plans.

I also am pleased with how my practice session went. I worked on a Bach cantata that we are singing Sunday for Reformation Sunday (I am singing the alto part which is fine) and then tackled a piece called "in Dreams" by Earnest. That is one of those choral pieces where the soprano part is not terribly high (the way some soprano parts are in Bach) and the alto part is quite low, but then the soprano part goes up to an A flat, which of course means I have to sing it pianissimo. I worked on it today and was able to do it. I do have bad memories of strugging with similar issues in a Randall Thompson piece, which I wrote about at length here but I hope I can put those aside and just be where my technique is now.

Lastly, I went through the Kryrie from the Verdi Requiem. I think the mezzo solo part in this work suits my voice perfectly - I just need to learn it. As I am mostly an "ear learner" what I did was plunk the part until I knew it, then sing it, then plunk it and sing along while the recording was on, to hear how it fit in with the whole work. I got through it and ended up in the right place. So this is a good start. I want to be spot-on with all the solos so that if the Pastor says I can use the church next March I will be ready to roll.

Also, the coloratura in the choir (whom I will call our "prima donna"; I am definitely the "seconda donna" so I need to "try harder" LOL) is going to sing one of the soprano solos from the cantata we're doing on Reformation Sunday. (Hits self on head. Next year I will be on top of this and see if whatever we're doing has an alto solo and get my bid in early.)

Lastly, it's never too early to start thinking about Christmas Eve. I copied the mezzo solo from the Saint Saens Christmas Oratorio a while ago. It's slow and it's short so I am going to see if I can ask to sing it on Christmas Eve at communion.

Who Am I?

I am taking a break from work (which I can ill-afford) to take up this existential question, because I think this is at the root of a lot of what is making me unhappy.

I have said, truly, that I am not sorry I don't earn my living singing (although it would be nice to have "getting my makeup and hair done" in my job description not to mention being able to travel on someone else's dime), nor do I wish I had an opera engagement (even an amateur one) every month on end.

Yes, I want to keep singing better and better (which I think I am) and yes, I wish someone would invite me to join them in a concert, which would make me feel that I really am a singer, and I definitely wish I could devote 2 hours a day to working on music, but the crux of it all, I think, is really this:

If the people who flit from regional house to regional house to perform and come to to New York for auditions are singers, and the people who pay through the nose to sing with the expletive deleted orchestra that treated me like garbage and go to several auditions a month are singers, then who am I?

I spend about 30 hours a week copyediting, 10 hours a week on eldercare, and maybe 5 hours a week singing - or maybe 10 if you include choir commitments. I sing maybe 7 church solos a year and maybe one "something else". Since I sang Dalila in 2008 the "something else" has had an audience of less than 20, or an audience primarily made up of nursing home residents.

One of the reasons I went to all those auditions wasn't that I seriously thought I'd be cast in anything, but because it was an excuse to get dressed up and sing in front of people and feel special. Most people get a "no thank you" so that was not hurtful. I suppose it kept it real. I had thought going to those meetups would keep it real but it just made me realize how insignificant I really was in the scheme of things.

Now one thing I have always been, whether I sang or not, was a diva.

Now the esteemed Susan Eichhorn Young whom I quote so often, said no one can call herself a diva who hasn't earned it. So hm....

Why do I say I'm a diva? My partner's sister, with whom I have almost nothing in common (she lives in Texas and likes Glen Beck) do have in common that we know we are divas. We love big hair, big makeup, bright colored clothes, gold jewelry (she can afford it, I can't, although she did give me one or two pieces she was tired of), and red home decor.

One of the earliest pictures of me (I don't have it - at one point I tore up most of my childhood pictures because I thought I was fat and ugly) is when I was three years old and sitting at my parents' upright piano, turning my head to try to imitate a cabaret singer showing off.

This picture shows what I looked like at 18 (I only let people take neck up pictures, but I think I look pretty hot and neither my hair nor my cosmetic style is "natural")

and

this is what I looked like in the mid90s when I was a baton twirler with the Big Apple Corps Marching Band. (Why should the guys have all the great outfits?)

So there you have it.

As I said to a friend a few minutes ago, if I lived in "East Eggshell, Iowa", I could really be a diva! Being a soloist at a local church and singing an aria outside a bake sale would be enough!

A Wish List

I know I should be working, not blogging, but all this soul searching I've been doing has led to my narrowing down what it is I want. In other words, what it is I'm missing that is making me so depressed.

I know what is not possible, and those things are not on the table. I am not asking to have a "career" singing, nor am I even asking to go to an audition for a leading role on the no-pay circuit and be cast in it (life is too short for me to want to perform a comprimaria role on the no-pay circuit).

I also know that pop psych blather about "not expecting validation from other people" blah blah blah, but that's hogwash. Everyone wants validation from other people. If you go to a dance, for example, it's nice if someone asks you to dance once in a while - you shouldn't have to do all the asking. Nor should your social life consist of you doing all the inviting. You should get to be a guest (the French word invitee sounds better in this context actually) some of the time.

I think what I wanted most of all was for some of the people I bumped into, who organize concerts, to invite me to sing with them.

We can start with the man who told me about the venue where I put on my concert a few weeks ago.

When I got into an email argument with him (not to repeat here in detail, but it was about his not using singers over 42 or making it sound as if that was what he was doing) he told me about this venue, so I pursued it. Did he invite me to sing in even one of the monthly concerts he puts on? No.
And he heard me sing at an audition and I don't think I did badly. If nothing else, I know I can make people go weak-kneed when I sing Mon Coeur and if you bump and grind in a low cut dress who gives a flying fig if you end the bloody aria on an (unwritten) B flat or on an F??

Did the woman who runs the Tuesday meetup invite me to sing in (or even audition for) a concert she was putting on? No. Did she keep me on her regular email routing or ever comment on anything I'd posted on Facebook or ask how I was? No.

Did the woman who rents out the place where I gave the concert personally invite me to sing at her soiree or even make an attempt to stay in touch? No,although this bothers me less, as she did say some really nice things to me that will stay with me for a long time, and she knows hundreds of people.

Yes, I do plan to continue to organize things myself. I mean,if I'm going to end up spending a few hundred dollars I would rather spend it on singing Dalila - or the mezzo solos from the Verdi Requiem - than on buying "tickets" to sing a tiny role in an opera that requires three nights a week of rehearsal.

But it just that all this makes me feel really "unwanted".

Baby D Posts a Want Ad

Friday I was talking to my therapist about how unhappy I am that I can't seem to find a meaningful way to participate in any of these Meetups, Sing-Things, Soirees, etc.

This is for at least three reasons: I have limited time,I have limited confidence, and I have no peer group or support system, even a support system of one (meaning a family member or peer who would come with me to some of these things).

When I started going to these kinds of things, I really thought I would meet some kind of peer group there and be able to network. Did I have an overly aggrandized view of myself? Why didn't anything click? Yes, I was nervous, but to some extent so is everyone. But most of the people I saw at those things had a history, and with that history came relationships, and out of relationships came opportunities to do things together, commiserate, support each other, make plans. The problem is aside from being one of a pool of choir soloists, I don't have anything like that, so I would go to those things and feel very alone. I would feel nervous, not to mention depressed because often I would have had a fight with my partner beforehand about why I was going at all, then I would feel that I didn't sing my best, and then I would get no feedback - I don't even mean feedback about my singing, I mean feedback about my place in the whole universe of singing.

To paraphrase Soujourner Truth, all the beginners were young and all the mature people were polished (and the mature people were barely in their late 40s).

So whom did I think I would meet at one of these things? A late-starting classical singer who wanted more than just being a soloist in a amateur chorus or choir but didn't have the time to rehearse an opera four nights a week? Someone who could sing his/her way through an aria or scene well enough to please an audience but not well enough to impress the cognoscenti??

So where are these people???? Do they even exist??

One thing I miss about that horrid Unitarian church was at least when I was there they did all sorts of things besides church services - cabarets, etc., so I could get up and sing an aria and be a diva for an evening, wear something fabulous, get a lot of applause, and not overtax myself. And usually I would know about this at least two months in advance so I could prepare myself.

The church where I sing now doesn't do these sorts of things.

Up until recently, I was measuring myself against how well I could sing the material I was singing. I had no idea, really, how extremely low down the food chain I was because I didn't really fathom the mass of talented people who were doing this.


So what do I want (I mean besides wanting to be able to sing well and put on some kind of something once or twice a year.)? (My last post was about how I defined success. OK. I know that. What I'm asking myself is what kind of environment do I want that I so desperately feel I don't have?)

So here goes:

SUPERANNUATED DIVA WITH MODEST TALENT is seeking classical singers over 50 who are not "professionals", "emerging professionals", or "managed". Preferably those who started singing late, sing well enough to slog through some operatic rep without making the audience cringe but don't have the time or money to get it together to sing this sort of material in public more the two or three times a year. A love of dressing to the nines and chewing up the scenery a plus.

I cynically thought of posting something like this on the forum but even thinking about that place makes me want to crawl under the couch.

There's also something Wizard of Oz-ish about all this, too. The Wizard told the Scarecrow he didn't need a brain, he needed a degree. There's a part of me that thinks what I need isn't a voice (I've got that) or a techniqiue (I've got a lot of that and who has it all anyhow?) or ever "the noive" as the Cowardly Lion says, but someone to validate me. A buddy who says "Hey, are you going to the Meetup on ____________?" "Let's go," gives me a shove and a smile, some honest feedback, and a promise that soon we would be back again.

What is My Definition of "Success"?

As so often happens, Susan Eichhorn Young taps into an issue that is close to my heart at the moment. In this post, she asks people to think about how they define success.

In light of my recent feelings of disappointment, this was a useful exercise for me.

I think at the age and stage I am now, my definition of success would include (not all of these are possible, but they are something to aspire to):

1. To be able to sing the roles in my fach (Dalila, Carmen, Amneris, Azucena, Laura, Cilea's Principessa - I think Eboli is a lost cause so I'm not including her, and Charlotte is a maybe) in a professional sounding way, without getting tired or having notes/phrases that are touch and go.

2. To have this acknowledged by other people - teachers, coaches, peers - whether or not they want to "hire" me or "promote" me in any way.

3. To have a regular venue for performing these roles that costs me a minimal amount of money (singing them in concert is fine).

4. To have a real support system of people who check in with me, encourage me, and act as a counterbalance for all the negative input I get from my partner.

What makes me feel so frustrated is I think that some of this is achievable. I have the natural raw material (a big dramatic mezzo voice), a good teacher, I know most of these roles by heart already, and I have a big dramatic personality. I have built up my stamina enormously over the past five years and I am blessed to be extremely healthy. Other than the fact that my knee injury and surgery make me less than "nimble" onstage, and that my neck is ugly, there is really nothing else about me that looks or sounds "old".

If I didn't think I was sitting on this mountain of talent I wouldn't be so frustrated. For example I love going to the ballet but I am not a ballerina and never thought I was, despite having taken ballet classes off and on (until I had my accident). But singing is different.

So, for example, if I were in the kind of environment that allowed me to put on one of these concerts every couple of months, I would feel "you win a few, you lose a few, you learn". But I will be lucky if I get to do something like this in six months (I'm hoping to pull off this Verdi Requiem but if the pastor says I have to pay to "rent" the church it's not on).

It's also, of course, the competition. I live in the heart of Manhattan (the closest opera company to my front door is the Met) where the competition is staggering. Interestingly, even though classical music is less popular than it was 30 years ago, there seem to be more people wanting to sing opera than in the past. When I was singing with the "opera underground" as it seems to now be laughingly referred to, I didn't sing as well as I do now, but the competition was much less. My teacher says some of this competition (not so much in my fach - mostly slim, pretty, light voiced sopranos and mezzos) comes from people crossing over from musical theater. So they are pretty with good acting skills and strong middle registers (this did not used to be the case with the higher voices on the amateur circuit). True, these people aren't competing for my roles, but there are enough who are to push me down and out.

I think what bothered me the most about those meetups, etc. was feeling that I was not treated with respect. I was mostly ignored. I don't do well being ignored. Possibly that had to do with my being older than everyone. The people who needed polishing were younger. So what was anyone going to say to me? It might have been different if I had a friend or buddy to take with me to some of these things, but I don't.

So I guess I should end my list of "success" with "being taken seriously".

CD

I was not thrilled with how I sounded on the CD. Some of what sounded bad, especially on the upper notes, was the result of distortion, but not all.

I will say that overall, let's say from middle C up to the G below high C, my voice sounds bigger, rounder, and more even. I sound like a real professional operatic mezzo. But the notes above that just sound like screaming. Singing up there sounded more pleasant, say, in 2008 when I sang Dalila, on the other hand the rest of my singing was not as good. My teacher said that. He said I mostly sort of crooned, and then saved my energy for a couple of top notes, which were still not easy for me. So there has definitely been progress. If I felt things were going in the wrong direction I would get another teacher. Things are going in the right direction - the problem is they are going in the right direction so slowly, and I'm not a 21 year old conservatory student or even a 31 year old with a big dramatic voice that hasn't gotten itself together yet, I'm bloody 61!!! So the fight to improve my technique, my stamina, and my confidence is racing against what the aging process is doing to my body.

And I have so little time, not just in the long term sense, but in the day to day sense. I have to earn a living, and so much of the rest of my time is taken up with eldercare. I don't have a circle of musical/performing friends with whom I can share these activities as part of my discretionary time - I am taking care of someone elderly, which entails not just doing chores for her on the weekend but also meeting with social workers, sending emails back and forth, etc.

So aside from an 30-60 minutes a day of practice, my choir commitments and my voice lessons, anything else has to be squeezed into the nooks and crannies and it's not enough.

Two years ago I had more confidence. I went to auditions (the only one that yielded anything ended up with my spending $450 on "tickets" to sing three pages of music, which the director hated, so I walked out - I don't mean in a diva huff - I wrote to the director to say I wasn't coming back). Now I just don't see the point. I wouldn't have time to participate in an intensive rehearsal schedule even if I did get something and the likelihood of my getting anything is almost nil anyhow. I used to mostly go to auditions for the thrill of getting dressed up and singing in front of people but I just don't have the heart for it any more.


My therapist of all people suggested that I go to a "Meetup" for singers, so I went intermittently, but the people there are so much more polished and even if they aren't making money singing (and never will) they are
out there performing big roles even for a fee or no pay and they sing for agents and they all know each other and give each other encouragement. I feel like I am so far below everyone on the food chain that I don't matter, which makes it hard for me even to sing my best, and it becomes a downward spiral.

The woman who rented me the space to do the concert and who was so encouraging and complimentary is having soirees and hosting master classes, but I just don't have the heart to go to any of them. I feel I will have to argue with my partner about taking the time and spending the (minimal amount of) money, that I will feel like a worm because I don't sound as polished as most of the other people and don't have a future in which to become much moreso.

Well, I sang well at my lesson and overall feel I am singing better than I was several months ago.

So I will look forward to making my CD.

Letdown

Well, it was bound to happen - the post-performance letdown. And I wasn't even all that ecstatic about the performance (the soprano I sang with made a CD and sent it to my teacher, so I can hear some of it Thursday at my lesson, I guess).

The lovely woman who runs the studio (and who has dedicated her life to helping singers) has now set up several "soirees" where people can get up and sing. It's funny. Two years ago I would have jumped at the opportunity to do something like that but now I just feel intimidated from all sides. I get no support at home (my partner was amazingly supportive of the concert as the day drew near, but she will think "enough is enough") and the people who would be there with me would make me feel like wallpaper. That's what happened when I went to those meetups. People were polite but kept their distance. I simply didn't interest them and that was obvious. And I'm not even talking about attracting the interest of a manager. I'm talking about being taken seriously. So then there would be a negative feedback loop and I would be nervous and/or depressed and wouldn't sing well.

In addition to these soirees this woman plans to sponsor master classes and when they're over, to give a concert and invite managers. Well, no manager is going to be interested in me - I would just be taking up space that could better go to someone else.

It's just all so disheartening.

So I need to focus on the positive. I am going to have a CD made at no charge by my mother's sound engineer friend. He is taking me to lunch at the end of the month and we can make a plan. Arias I plan to record are:

Do over

O Mio Fernando (La Favorita)
Stella del Marinar (Laura's aria from La Gioconda)
Liber Scriptus (Verdi Requiem)
Amour Viens Aider (Samson et Dalila)


New

Fenena's aria from Nabucco
Acerba Volutta (Adriana Lecouvreur)
O Ma Lyre (Gounod's Sappho)
Mon Coeur (for my friend from adolescence who encouraged me to do this in the first place)

And I need to start learning the Requiem

The choir director seemed to think I would need to "rent" the church to put this on but said I should ask the Pastor. She came to my concert and seems to like my singing, so she may let me use the church if I put the concert on during Lent and give the ticket takings to whatever charity she would like.

Tuesday Morning Quarterbacking, with Help from Susan and Others

Well, after sleeping on it for several days, I feel better about the concert. Neither my teacher nor the soprano I sang with said I sang well, because they both heard me sing better.

But the audience liked it, and I communicated something to the audience about these characters. The biggest compliment I got was from the woman who rents out the studio, herself a dramatic mezzo, who has sung Azucena. She told me that for those moments I was Azucena.

As with so many things, nobody says it better than Susan Eichhorn Young.

Great singers have flaws. Callas had them, God knows. I love Maria Guleghina and I am bored witless by Dawn Upshaw. I mean of course as with all artists I respect her artistry, but I am not moved by the pretty, well-schooled voice.

People laugh at someone like Paul Potts, but in the 1940s or 1950s, that is who big agents would have been chasing and trying to polish, not a cookie cutter cookie from a conservatory with perfect pitch who can play several instruments and sightread obscure contemporary music, all with no passion.

My voice has a lot of flaws. Is that because I started studying so late (even 26, when I began studying seriously the first time, is "late")? Is it because I drank until I was 25 and smoked until I was 26? Is it because I am impetuous and passionate rather than scholarly? (I can throw myself into the study of a role or a piece of sacred music - even a piece of choral music - but I can't bring myself to crack the solfege book and if you ask me what key I'm singing in I have no idea.)

I don't want my voice to have flaws, and I have worked hard on my technique (if I hadn't minded my ps and qs every second at the concert, I wouldn't have even sounded as good as I did)and have reined in my passion but I will never have a perfect scale, like a string of pearls, with every note the same size.

God knows I have lived. The relationship I've had with my partner over three decades could rival the plot of every opera not to mention the high drama that was unleashed by my relationship with The Mentor.

So now I will put the Trovatore score away for a while and get back to some arias I haven't sung for a while, for my recording.

It's Over

So the concert is over. I didn't sing as well as I would have liked. The B flat in "Condotta" was fine but the room was so dry that I found singing very effortful. Then of course I got nervous and my breathing got off. I had trouble with the A in the big run in the duet although I saved myself at the end.

I thought the intermission break would do me good (I had a cough drop and some water) but again it was so dry I felt like my throat was closing up and I didn't do well with the first A flat in the Aida duet although I finished the piece off with a bang.

And I think I did an excellent acting job and everything went pretty smoothly musically give or take once or twice when we were not together with the pianist.

Both my teacher and the soprano said they had heard me sing it better but neither made me feel I had sung it badly, so that was good, and the soprano said she would be interested in singing with me again, so I asked her if she knew the soprano part to the Verdi Requiem and she said she did and she might be interested.

My choir director and the pastor from my church came. I was quite surprised that the pastor came because she hadn't RSVP'd one way or another. They both seemed to really like it and I know the choir director has very high standards. The elderly violinist also came. They all said how big my voice is and that they wish they could hear me in a big house, which was flattering. And a few friends came.

I feel sort of numb. Not pleased enough with it to be euphoric, but not devastated either.

I will know more when I hear the tape my teacher made, if it comes out.

So now I have family business to take care of, and plans for the CD I want to make, with the help of my "angel".

And now I have to go to bed because I have to be at church at 8:30. Not a problem as we are singing something simple.